Last Wish List
by Artemis Teranika Ryann
Summary: I don’t have long to live – I have a disease that can only be cured by a potion that will never be made.... Hermione Granger is determined to make the best of the rest of her life... no matter how short it may be.
1. Prologue

Last Wish List 

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**By Artemis Teranika Ryann**

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**Prologue**

When the girls in all the stories, and in all the fairy tales, blush, it's described as a delicate shade of pink creeping up their bodies to their cheeks, making the guys – men, really – smile and desire them. When _I_ blush, there's no delicate creeping, no pink-tinged cheeks. I go bright red, all over my face. When _I_ blush, there's no guys – not men – smiling and desiring me. I mean, honestly, red is _not_ a pretty colour when you're wearing it on your face.

I don't have long to live – I have a disease that can only be cured by a potion that will never be made. It requires parts of an extinct animal to create it, and no one has any of those parts – not even the Ministry. They had no need – my disease is as rare as naturally born chickens with blue polka dots sired by a horse and a monkey. Plus, it isn't contagious. Dumbledore sent off a request for a bottle of the potion – the Ministry used to have some – but there was only one bottle left, and it had been smashed on the ground. An accident, most would say. But Lucius Malfoy has no accidents. Besides, what better way for a mudblood to die than slowly, growing weaker each day, developing hot/cold flushes, a heart-wrenching cough, rashes, amongst other symptoms, before finally dying in immense pain, collapsing to the ground to cough up her life's-blood? The Ministry Officials just shook their heads and gave me sympathetic looks. But they did give my family ten thousand galleons – after all, the disease is the result of Ministry experiments – and the offer of a painless drought of sleeping death. Fall asleep one night, and simply never wake up. I thanked them and accepted the drought, but told them that I would probably not use it. After all, I _do_ want to finish school before I die.

But I guess if I'm going to die, I may as well have some goals to achieve, right? I suppose I mightn't finish them all, but at least there will be something to work towards, to fight away the bitter bite of death.

**The Last Wish List of Hermione Ryann Granger – sufferer of Mugrote.**

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I. Finish becoming an Animagus – Registered, of course.

II. Win a contest.

III. Graduate.

IV. Learn how to fly.

V. Date someone not in Gryffindor.

~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~

_I realize that this is **really** short, but it is only a prologue. Next chappie soon, I promise. I'm still continuing **'The Dark Merlin'**, I just had this idea, and I couldn't put it down! The rest of the story will probably be in 3rd person p.o.v., you know, she, he, not I, me_


	2. All That's Left Of Yesterday

Last Wish List 

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**By Artemis Teranika Ryann**

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**Chapter One: All That's Left Of Yesterday.**

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Sitting in a compartment on the Hogwarts Express was a depressed girl with her nose stuck in _'Hogwarts: A History'_. Her hair was bushy, but it had calmed down quite a bit. Her eyes were honey-brown, and her skin was clear, though a light dusting of freckles covered her nose. This girl was Hermione Granger, a Muggleborn Gryffindor in her last year. Hermione sighed, turning the pages of her book as if reading the words, but not even seeing them. Her thoughts were on her summer, and why she was depressed…

~*

"Hermione, dear?" Mrs. Granger called to her daughter.

"Yes, Mum?" Hermione replied, coming down the stairs to the lower level.

"There is someone here to see you." Mrs. Granger said nervously. Hermione raised her eyebrows, but followed her mother into the kitchen. Someone stood looking out the window, their back to her.

"May I help you?" Hermione asked politely. The man whirled around, almost startled, but Hermione had a feeling this man didn't surprise easily.

"Miss Granger?" Hermione nodded. "Miss _Hermione_ Granger?"

"Yes, that is I."

"I am Conan Marsh, from the Health department of the Ministry of Magic." He paused. "Is there somewhere we can go to sit down and talk?"

"Of course, how foolish of me!" Mrs. Granger exclaimed. "Right this way." She led them to the Lounge Room. "Can I get you anything to drink?"

"No, I can do it. What would you like, Mrs. Granger, Miss Granger?"

"Um, just a tea." Mrs. Granger answered, taken slightly aback.

"A butterbeer, please." Hermione smiled.

Conan withdrew his wand from his sleeve and waved it. There stood a cup of tea and two butterbeers.

"Now, Miss Granger, I'll get straight to business." Conan took a sip from his butterbeer. "Please understand that I've never had to tell anyone this, and that this is one of the most difficult things to tell anyone… Miss Granger… you are suffering from Mugrote."

"Mugrote." Hermione stated numbly.

"Do you know what Mugrote is, Miss Granger?"

Hermione gave him a 'don't-insult-me' glare and recited the illness's symptoms as if there was a textbook in front of her.

"Mugrote, a fatal disease. This illness has only one cure, a Draught of Life, which is made using the wings of a Crarphin, one inch of one strand of unicorn tail hair, four Stunner Mushrooms, collected in the full moon, a lock of banshee hair and three drops of a Pureblood's blood, willingly given. As the Crarphin is now extinct, the Draught is difficult to make. It is not a contagious disease, and is very rare. The disease is found in a gland that all Magical Folk have inside them, but most Magical Folk never contract the disease, as the gland remains dormant through out the person's life. Unfortunately, some Magical Folk _do _get the disease, due to a ruptured gland. As the gland is very well protected, the gland will only become ruptured if the disease swells within it, splitting the skin of the gland and releasing the virus. The symptoms of Mugrote are: The victim grows weaker each day, until they cannot move. They develop flushes, going from hot to cold almost instantaneously. A cough, almost from the start of the disease. It starts off as a normal, 'I-have-a-cold' kind of cough, and then becomes a 'I-think-I'm-going-to-die' kind of cough. Rashes spread over the victim's body, blistering and making the skin scaly. There are other symptoms that vary with the victim. Eventually the victim dies in immeasurable pain, coughing up their life's-blood."

Mrs. Granger's eyes were wide in shock, her mouth open in horror. "Y-you _do_ have the cure… don't you?"

Conan looked at her in sympathy. "I'm sorry. The Ministry _did_ have a bottle… but the person sent to fetch it dropped it. The bottle smashed and the potion was lost." A look of dismay crossed Mrs. Granger's face. Hermione, on the other hand, was calm. 

"Isn't Mugrote the result of Ministry experimentation." It was a statement, not a question.

"Yes. That is another reason I am here. The Ministry gives ten thousand galleons to the family of the victim if the Ministry cannot help. Also, I'm here to give Miss Granger a Draught of Painless Sleeping Death." He held a thin, twisting, elegant bottle out to Hermione.

Hermione hesitated, then took the bottle and placed it on the coffee table, very carefully.

"Thank you, Mr. Marsh. I will take this potion, but it is unlikely I will drink it. I would like to graduate. Now if you will excuse me."

Hermione left the room, leaving the bottle where it was…

~*

"Hermione!" A voice broke her concentration. She looked up, somewhat startled. Harry and Ron sat down in the seats opposite her

"Oh. Hello, Harry, Ron."

"My holidays were fine, thanks for asking." Ron said sarcastically.

Hermione forced a smile. She closed her book. "We need to talk. Can you get Ginny? Tell her it's urgent." Harry stood up, puzzled, but left for Ginny.

Ron tried to catch Hermione's eye, trying to find out what was wrong, but Hermione turned away, putting a bookmark in the book and tucking it away.

Ginny and Harry rejoined them, sitting down.

Hermione put up a silencing ward on the door, locking it the Muggle way. Harry and Ron exchanged confused glances.

"I don't want anyone else to know." Hermione muttered.

"What, are you pregnant?" Ron joked, trying to break the ice.

Hermione laughed humorlessly. "If only." Harry and Ginny exchanged alarmed glances.

"Just spit it out, Mione!" Ginny said impatiently.

Hermione cleared her throat. "Um… there's no easy way to tell you this… I'm –" A cough broke her sentence. Ginny frowned and patted her on the back. "Thanks, Gin. I'm dying." Hermione whispered bluntly. A stunned silence covered the compartment, then Ron started laughing.

"Good one, Mione. I almost believed you!"

Harry was watching Hermione's features. "I don't think that was a joke, Ron."

"It wasn't. I'm suffering from Mugrote."

"From what?" Harry asked, seriously.

"Mugrote. It's a fatal disease. I won't go into detail, but suffice to say that I could die anytime between the end of this month and by the time I'm twenty. No one with the disease has survived past that age."

"Sure they have!" Ginny said cheerfully. "Just send to the Ministry for the cure."

Hermione shook her head. "Lucius Malfoy smashed the only bottle they had. There is no cure for me."

"Couldn't they just remake it?" Ron asked.

"No. The potion needs parts of an extinct animal."

Ginny burst into tears and clutched Hermione to her like she was dying – which, ironically, she was. Hermione smoothed back Ginny's fiery hair, comforting the younger girl. "It's okay, Ginny. Everyone dies sooner or later. I'm just, well, going to die sooner, rather than later."

And as the train pulled up into Hogsmeade station, Hermione gathered her things and left the compartment last – savouring the last time she would probably see the compartment she'd seen twice every year for the last six years.


	3. Tormented Daily

Last Wish List 

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**By Artemis Teranika Ryann**

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**Chapter Two: Tormented Daily.**

Hermione's face split into a radiant smile as she accepted the graduation scroll from Professor McGonagall. She stepped up to the podium and delivered the speech due to the class valedictorian.

_"Class of '98… We are here today to leave one of the places our hearts will –"_

Hermione sat up in pain, clutching her stomach, all illusions of the happy dream gone. After a moment, the pain subsided and the black spots cleared from her eyes, permitting her enough sight to see the Head Girl suite in the minimal pre-dawn light. Hermione sank back down onto her purple pillow, a light sheen of perspiration covering her forehead. A bleak acceptance had engulfed her. She would not live to see her 21st birthday, but she would live each day as if it were her last – which it could, plausibly, be.

Hermione bit her lip, and almost unwillingly climbed out of her bed, moving into the bathroom she shared with the Head Boy. Another piece of bad news, she remembered with a jolt. The Head Boy alongside her this year was none other than Draco Malfoy. But that wasn't what she'd come in here for. Hermione pulled open the drawer that had all her female necessities in it and withdrew the twisting, elegant bottle that held the Draught of Painless Sleeping Death from its hiding place at the bottom of the drawer. She sat on the edge of the many-tapped spa bath and held the bottle in her hands, her fingers tracing the refined carvings of the delicate aqua glass, almost in a reverie. Angrily she came back to herself and returned the bottle carefully to its hideaway in the draw, slamming the draw shut. The potion called to her, demanding her attention several times a day. Numerous times in class Ron and Harry had discovered her doodling a likeness of the bottle, becoming concerned when she tore up or burnt the parchment the picture was on, even shocking Professor Flitwick by burning a revision test that had had an image of the bottle on it.

Hermione sighed, her anger ebbing away as she locked the door to the bathroom, running a bath and sinking in it, losing herself in jasmine-scented bubbles and oils, her spirit soaring away from her body for the much needed sleep.

~*

When she came to, her first thought was that there was an earthquake. She quickly realized the bath she'd drawn was cold and that the 'earthquake' was pounding on the door of the bathroom.

"Granger! I don't know _what_ you are doing in there, but hurry up! Classes start in two hours, and I need a shower. _Granger!_ Out, out, out!" Malfoy's voice drifted through the door and Hermione struggled out of the bathtub, pulling the plug to allow the water to drain and wrapping herself in a royal purple towel, her damp hair hanging around her shoulders. She unlocked the door and opened it, glaring at the blonde male who stood, his fist raised to rap on the door again, dressed only in a pair of Sponge-Bob Squarepants boxers. Hermione stifled laughter and met his angry and stunned grey eyes.

"Honestly, Granger, put some clothes on, no one needs to see _you_ in a towel in the morning… wait, no one needs to see you in a towel _ever_."

Hermione smirked at him. "This coming from the pureblood fanatic who is currently clad in naught but a pair of boxers printed with a Muggle cartoon – Sponge-Bob Squarepants, no less." To Hermione's surprise and delight, Malfoy's cheeks went pink with embarrassment.

As Hermione pushed past him to the Head Girl's door and opening it, she tossed over her shoulders, "Very stylish, Malfoy." She closed the door on his sputtering outrage and burst into laughter in the safety of her own room.

~*

Hermione pulled on her other shoe and, fully dressed and ready for class, left the security of her bedroom to enter the Common Room. She heard a scream of frustration from the bathroom. Curious, she opened the door to the bathroom and peered in to where Malfoy stood, up to his knees in grey-green sludge, which was beginning to lap at the bottom of his towel.

Hermione couldn't help herself; she laughed. 

Malfoy glared at her. "Granger… I command you to fix this mess!"

Hermione only laughed harder.

Malfoy sighed, and wincingly added a whispered, "Please?"

Hermione abruptly stopped laughing. "What?"

Malfoy swallowed his pride and winced again, "Granger, could you… please… help me?"

Startled, Hermione waved her wand and muttered the cleaning spell, leaving Malfoy standing in a towel in the bath. She turned away from him, and just as she left the bathroom, she heard a whispered, "Thank you," that she was certain she wasn't meant to hear. She paused in the doorway, and, looking over her shoulder, replied softly, "You're welcome."

She stepped out of the bathroom, and, just in time to ruin the sentimental moment, broke into a series of body-wrecking coughs that made her reach for the door-jam to stay upright. A hand whacked her on the back a few times, and through watering eyes, Hermione was shocked to see Malfoy patting her back.

When the coughs subsided Hermione sagged against the door, breathing heavily.

"That's a nasty cough, Granger. You should get it checked out." Malfoy sounded… almost concerned. Hermione looked up at him, confused.

Malfoy fixed a sneer in place. "I wouldn't want to have to do all the Head duties myself." He stalked off.

Hermione shook her head in disgust and sunk to the ground.

~*

The next day, Malfoy had already left when the coughs kicked in, and Hermione was grateful. She didn't need him to see her so weak. But that night, she wasn't so lucky…

~*

The golden-scaled dragon opened one eyelid to reveal silver eyes as Hermione's chest constricted and her throat burned.

"Granger?" He asked, lifting his golden head. An earthquake shook the valley they were in. "Granger, I thought I told you to get that cough checked out? For crying out loud, Granger, I need sleep. Stop your bloody coughing and get a drink or something. Granger!"

"Granger! Wake up, wake up, wake up!" Hermione's eyes snapped open and she realized she couldn't breathe. She gagged and sat bolt upright, hitting her head on something hard. As breathing returned to her, she saw a dark form stumble away from her bed, swearing blackly.

"Bloody hell, Granger, you have a really hard head!" Malfoy rubbed his forehead, glaring at her as he snapped on the lights.

Hermione stared at him with wide eyes, then realized he was in her room, at night, while she was only wearing her night-gear.

She screamed.

Or, at least, she tried to. But you need your voice to be able to scream, and Hermione's was… well, absent. Her hand flew to her mouth, shock written all over her face.

"What is it, Granger? Cat got your tongue?" Malfoy sneered. "Oh well, at least you've stopped coughing. Now I'm going back to sleep."

He turned and stalked from the room.

Hermione crawled out of bed, grabbing her wand and a dressing-gown and she stumbled out of her bedroom and into the common room, where she pushed open the portrait and staggered to the Hospital Wing.

~*#*~

Sorry it takes so long to put up chapters, peeps, but year nine has me bogged down with assignments on melanoma and homework on trigonometry. Not happy.


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